Asked to define the style of their tour, the Lions call it Wales-Wasps. A lot of the players are W-W – somewhere around the 16 mark, although it is hard to tell, what with Ryan Jones arriving and departing in all the time it took to tap his head and discover a fault. Many of the coaches are W-W and so are even more of their training sessions, the short, sharp blasts that have impressed everyone.

As the England hooker Lee Mears, one of the revelations of the tour so far, put it: "Thirty-five minutes sometimes, and they say: 'Well done. That's it.' I'm thinking that's an hour and a half less than what I'm used to."

W-W, and yet there is still an essential Irishness to the brand. It may not be expressed in vast numbers, as Ireland may account for no more than five of the Durban Test starting line-up: Paul O'Connell, Jamie Heaslip, David Wallace, Brian O'Driscoll and Tommy Bowe, with Luke Fitzgerald possibly a sixth on the left wing.

They are all, however, key players, with the captain in the second row, two of the all-important back row, the incomparable O'Driscoll in the centre and the best player on current form anywhere, Bowe, on the right wing. Ireland form a solid lump of security through the team.

Well, it's certainly true in Bowe's case. He is scoring tries, one in the Rustenburg opener and two of them against the Golden Lions. More importantly for the team effort, he created three times as many in that second game, his long passing and short off-loading revealing a wing playing with his head up and eyes fully open.

He puts it all down to confidence, born of moving to the Ospreys in Wales when his career with Ulster seemed to be stalling. "I spent a fair time playing with Ulster at Ravenhill not involved in the game," he said in Cape Town last week. "Moving to Wales was not a decision I took lightly, but I took my game back to basics and concentrated on what I do best. The Ospreys encouraged me to go searching, to become as involved as possible."

Bowe is from County Monaghan, one of the three counties of Ulster in the Republic. He played Gaelic football for the Monaghan Minors – you can tell the Irish players who have been brought up in the Gaelic Athletic Association, for they all have a mastery of the ball played overhead.

He went to Royal School Armagh in Northern Ireland, and was capped young, at 20, by Ireland. But in 2006 he was dropped after the France-Ireland game in Paris, when the French rattled up 40 points before half-time. He injured his knee on tour in Argentina and was left out of the 2007 Ireland World Cup squad as the selectors opted for the ­convert from rugby league, Brian Carney.

Those were the low times. He began to head back to the surface with the erratic but extravagant Ospreys, developing new skills by sometimes playing in the centre. He burst through in the Six Nations with a set of outstanding displays in Ireland's grand slam run and suddenly he was Tommy Bowe, must-have winger for the Lions.

He is big, strong and in form, just perfect to go face to face with Bryan Habana: "If I am picked for the first Test," he said, "I will know I'm good enough to come up against anyone."

Paul O'Connell, too, will have to face one of the best in the world. His contest with Victor Matfield in the middle of the line-out is going to be one of the hot spots of the series.

There is, however, a diversionary matter that is making life uncomfortable for the Lions captain. It is all to do with O'Connell the ball carrier. He does a lot of what they call "taking the ball up", and, in truth, he is not the best at it, especially when momentum, as it sometimes can be against well-laid defences, is lost.

When the ball is released slowly from the breakdown the Lions often end up shipping it to a single runner who takes the pass standing still. It compounds the sense of going nowhere, and not even fast. "There have been times, say around the 40-metre mark, when we have slowed down," O'Connell acknowledged. "It's easy when we're regenerating quick ball, but off slow ball, we have to think about it. Put together a play and regain momentum."

The trouble is that the captain seems to be the one who makes himself available for the play, which has been little more than a pop-pass to him and crunch, down he goes. It is a rugby martyrdom, the captain taking on the job that leaves him exposed and looking out of sorts.

"Going off on your own will not generate quick ball," he agreed. "If I was doing that I'd rather be doing it with two or three guys together." I think that is an admission of a fault and that the Lions are working on the problem.

The matter could be solved by leaving the captain out of the exposed area, letting him concentrate on the line-out. He is Europe's outstanding middle-jumper and he should be encouraged to devote himself to challenging Matfield, the world's best.

Mears, the hooker who has adapted brilliantly to the shorter training regime and emerged as a burrowing, precise ace in the front row, is better at making a precious foot or two from the laboured breakdown. Or David Wallace, with his low centre of gravity and leg thrust. Anybody, really, bar the captain, who weighs a ton (or 111kg) but is slim of hip and upright.

The Lions insist they have not revealed anything like a full hand. It's not just a question of moves, but also of driving mauls infrequently and challenging on the opposition line-out throw. Simplicity has to remain their essence, but the spectrum will broaden.

I suspect this will mean putting the boot to the ball at the first sign of halted traffic. Send the ball from the floor into the air. Give it some of the old GAA, and when it's up there, the Irish influence will still be all-important.